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Thursday, December 22, 2005

Now Showing: King Kong

Critics are raving about Peter Jackson's remake of the movie King Kong. My family and I beg to disagree. We came up with other titles for the movie:

"So Long, King Kong: What's taking you so long?""The Long Kong""Making the King Kong Too Long"

We went last Sunday night to the movies not because we wanted to see the huge gorilla but because it was Peter Jackson who directed it. Like the rest of the world, we wanted to see this genius' take on a monstrous story and be swept in the fantastic world of movie magic. After all, we saw some of the movie sets they used during our recent visit to Universal Studios in Hollywood.

Peter Jackson flexed his directing muscles all right, but clearly he was entertaining himself and not his audience. On the way home from the three-hour long hodgepodge of drama, action and comedy rolled into one, my sister, her bf, and my mom felt cheated of three hours of our lives.

Maybe Peter Jackson thought he was making another trilogy:

Part One: How the Blonde Girl Won a Role in an Imaginary MoviePart Two: The Island and the Overkill of Monsters Part Three: King Kong: Lost in New York

If George Lucas could use a scriptwriter, in my book Peter Jackson needs an editor, one who is more considerate of his audience's time. It took him an hour to get to the island and introduce the hero of the film and another hour to end the movie. Waiting for the film to end was like waiting for the dentist to finish your root canal. It was painful, yet you had to sit through everything to endure it.

I am an ice skating fan but there is nothing cute about King Kong sliding through ice while the residents of New York city were having the scare of their lives. I have no problem with temporary suspension of disbelief but this time, director Peter Jackson went too far. There were too many closeups on the beautiful, skinny heroine and too many bugs and too many monsters. Director Peter Jackson tried to communicate several themes at the same time - a satire on Hollywood, a tribute to great movies, a remake that seeks to improve on the original, a love story, and countless other sub-themes. One could see Moulin Rouge, Jurassic Park, Chicago and other films woven into this one's storyline.

My family and I would have appreciated the film had it been separated into three separate movies, one hour each.

Don't take my word for it, though, go watch the movie, but do it only when you don't have work the next day, otherwise you won't have the time to spare for this.

I am a fan of Peter Jackson's LOTR trilogy. Maybe he did this film thinking of the pressure fans like me placed on his shoulders to come up with something half as good as the three classics he already accomplished.

You tried too hard, Mr. Jackson. I would have been satisfied with the love story angle alone (but that's just me!). Other people would have survived on the gore factor. Still, others would have been entertained enough with the vaudeville act.

You can't please all of us at the same time. We would appreciate your work more if you had kept your focus.